Palm plays cat-and-mouse with Apple, reenables iTunes sync

When Palm first enabled "MediaSync" that allowed the Pre to work with iTunes, …

Palm passive-aggressively fired back at Apple in its 1.1.0 update to the Pre's webOS Thursday night. Among the handful of changes that came with the point update, the software restores syncing functionality with iTunes after Apple unceremoniously "fixed" the "problem" last week. The move is the latest in this high-profile cat-and-mouse game between Apple and Palm, and Palm seems to be willing to keep poking the fate bear—but to what end?

webOS 1.1.0 isn't all about iTunes compatibility. Among other things, it contains a number of useful updates to the Pre, including better timezone support in the Clock application, improved syncing with Google when you edit a Google contact, and the addition of emoticons in text, multimedia, and instant messages. The software also gained some enterprise features in the form of Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) support that allows for remote wipe, PIN/passwords, inactivity timeouts, and improved certificate handling.

These are all very welcome updates (and our Pre-using staff members greatly appreciate them), but the one that has caught the attention of everyone following the Apple-Palm soap opera is a line in the release notes that reads, "[r]esolves an issue preventing media sync from working with latest version of iTunes (8.2.1)."

Apple's update was essentially shot across the bow to Palm, but Palm doesn't seem to be listening to the message. Nicely summarized by Gizmodo chief Brian Lam on Twitter, "Palm fixing iTunes sync is kind of like trying to make out with someone who doesn't want to make out with you. Again." Surely the company's developers must know that Apple will not only be irked by this development, but that its own developers are undoubtedly already working on another fix to invalidate the new workaround.

And, if that's the case, how long will this game continue? Frankly, we're dying to see whether Apple and Palm will continue to release update after update in order to outrun each other but, realistically, it can't be a good use of either company's resources. On top of it all, it's not exactly a secret that Windows users (and even some Mac users) aren't fond of iTunes in the first place—wouldn't it be better if Palm dedicated some of its resources to writing a good media application of its own?